Finance
Recession? Really? Come on…: Morning Brief
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And just like that, everyone is a recession expert.
Two weeks ago, most self-proclaimed finance experts hadn’t uttered the word recession since it was fashionable in late 2022/early 2023.
From late July to early August, the prevailing sentiment of those seemingly in the know was 1) Nvidia (NVDA) shares were due for another 50% move after earnings on Aug. 28; 2) a 10% year-end rally for the S&P 500; and 3) a 100% move in Nvidia’s stock price in 2025.
Yet here we are, with the pros scaring the heck out of everyone the past week on the potential for a recession after a “bad” jobs report last Friday. Two top Wall Street banks raised their recession probabilities this week, for example.
These pros have voiced their concerns on TV, social media, and in research reports, but they also conveyed them to global trading desks. Markets were pushed into choppy seas as crowded AI trades such as AMD (AMD) have been dumped, with no nod to their underlying fundamentals.
All this recession talk feels like BS to me, an excuse to shake out the average investor so institutional players could get back into high-flying names at cheaper prices. Everyone does know that a recession often means negative economic growth, right? Or a significant slowdown in the economy that lasts quarters or even years?
So the US economy is going to go from 2.8% second quarter GDP growth and a long period of steady expansion to slightly negative growth or worse sometime within the next six months? An economy still creating a good clip of jobs each month is going to begin producing job losses in the near future?
Where is the evidence to support this? What’s the trigger for it? Don’t hit me up on X, formerly Twitter, and say it’s interest rates because the economy has been doing just fine during this high rate period.
Lost in recession BS this week was an ISM services report, which includes data on business activity, new orders, employment, and supplier deliveries. The index clocked in at 51.4%, up from 48.8% in June.
Numbers over 50% are seen as positive for the economy. Most companies in the report said business was either flat or expanding gradually.
Then, initial jobless claims totaled a seasonally adjusted 233,000 for the week — a drop of 17,000. The Street was looking for a print of around 240,000.
Corporate earnings season has gone quite well too. The majority of well-known public companies are easily beating sales and profit forecasts, not shocking the masses with giant misses. Outlooks have been solid.
That’s recessionary? Come on!
Now, I am not going to sit here and blow smoke and say everything is peachy. Many households are struggling to make ends meet because of sticky inflation, something I was reminded of when chatting with P&G’s (PG) CEO Jon Moeller a week ago.
I think the interview by Yahoo Finance’s Brooke DiPalma at the NYSE with Dine Brands (DIN) CEO John Peyton was also eye-opening on this front.
“It’s a value war. It’s a fight for share of wallet. … At a time when our target guest is dining out less, we have to make sure that when they do choose to dine out — IHOP or Applebee’s or Fuzzy’s are their first choice,” Peyton said.
The same goes for DiPalma’s exclusive interview with Molson Coors (TAP) CEO Gavin Hattersley.
“Consumers [are] making different pack sizes choices,” Hattersley said. He said this behavior has been going on “for a while” and is “pretty consistent through through Q2.”
Conversations I had this past week with top leaders further shed light on these macro challenges.
Disney (DIS) CFO Hugh Johnston told me demand at its theme parks tailed off in the final few weeks of the quarter. The company sees this slowdown persisting for the next few quarters.
“We certainly see consumers behaving in a way — I wouldn’t call it recessionary necessarily — they’re watching their pennies a little bit more,” Johnston said. Lost in the sauce, though, was a strong quarter for Disney’s streaming businesses. In a recession, people usually cut unnecessary expenses.
Ralph Lauren (RL) CEO Patrice Louvet told me (video above) this when I asked him if the consumer is behaving recessionary: “I think it’s pretty clear wherever you look that the overall consumer is being pressured by the cumulative effect of inflationary pressures and interest rates. As far as our core consumer is concerned, we actually find them to be very resilient.”
The company still notched sales growth in its North American stores.
All in all, you don’t get the sense the economy has already jumped over a cliff and is falling to the ground. As a result, it’s hard to justify some of these severe down days we have witnessed in markets this week.
What appears to be unfolding is a gradual cooling in the economy that could prove short-lived, especially if the Fed cuts rates, as Cognizant (CTSH) CEO Ravi Kumar told me on my Opening Bid podcast this week.
Labor market developments of late “seem more consistent with post-reopening normalization and gradual rates drag than any current shock or accelerating weakness but the risk is present,” said 22V Research strategist Peter Williams in a note this week.
I think that’s a fair assessment. What’s not fair is all this recession hysteria talk.
Three times each week, I field insight-filled conversations with the biggest names in business and markets on my Opening Bid podcast. Find more episodes on our video hub. Watch on your preferred streaming service. Or listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.
In the below Opening Bid episode, Trump’s former nominee to the Federal Reserve Judy Shelton shares why the Fed should be focused on 0% inflation.
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DULUTH — The Duluth Homegrown Music Festival is seeking both new operational leadership and a solution to financial filing issues that caused the organization to lose its federal tax-exempt status, which it has not held since 2022.
The organization is currently operating as a taxable nonprofit, confirmed Don Ness, the former Duluth mayor who serves as president of Homegrown’s
board of directors.
Ness and the board are working to discern whether there might be any outstanding tax liabilities in the wake of an apparent filing lapse.
“It’s a serious matter that requires diligence to do things right, and to correct past oversight, and to make sure that we are in full compliance with all tax and regulatory requirements,” Ness said. “The board is 100% committed to that course of action.”
As the Duluth Monitor first reported, Homegrown had its federal tax-exempt status revoked in 2022 after failing to make required financial reports for three years. The Monitor also reported that Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office has notified the organization it may be in violation of state law requiring the proper registration of soliciting charities.
Clint Austin / Duluth Media Group file photo
“All but one of us have been on for less than a year,” Ness said of the current board members. “We’ve been committed to saying, ‘hey, we need to improve the points of accountability.’”
The organization will also require new operational leadership. Co-directors Cory Jezierski and Dereck Murphy-Williams resigned earlier this month, after leading Homegrown through four successful festivals.
“My contract ended at the end of May, and I knew a few days later that I did not want to continue in that position,” Jezierski said. “Simply put, it was the best thing for my mental health. It’s a job that requires many, many hours and a lot of work, and it can be very stressful as well.”
Amy Arntson / Duluth Media Group file photo
Murphy-Williams did not respond to an interview request for this article, nor did preceding Homegrown director Melissa LaTour. According to LaTour’s
LinkedIn profile,
she was Homegrown director from 2016 to 2022.
Jason Beckman, a recent president who is no longer serving on the board, responded to a News Tribune email but did not provide an interview availability before this article went to press.
Ness does not believe the reporting lapses were due to any ill intent. He praised Jezierski and Murphy-Williams for their success managing festival operations. “They cared deeply about the festival,” he said. “It’s amazing to see that our community continues to support this really unique and special festival.”
“Those guys run a hell of a festival,” said Scott Lunt, festival founder and a current board member. “I think they needed help with bookkeeping.”
Clint Austin / Duluth Media Group file photo
By Jezierski’s account, issues with the festival’s tax status became apparent shortly after he became co-director. “We went to file taxes, they were rejected,” Jezierski said. “At that time we, of course, didn’t know why right away, but once we started pulling on that thread, we unraveled a whole lot of the problems that were going on.”
Jezierski said “it took a long time to try to get any sort of help” from the board, but said that by the time he and Murphy-Williams left the organization, “everything had been turned over to be reconciled” with a financial professional.
Ness, like Lunt, was deeply involved with Homegrown in its first decade but had not had an official role with the festival since then. After launching the festival in 1999 and running it on his own for several years, Lunt was “burnt out,” Ness remembered.
Derek Montgomery / Duluth Media Group file photo
After a transition period during which the festival was run in partnership with the Ripsaw newspaper, Homegrown established a nonprofit organization in 2006 with Ness as festival director. Ness subsequently stepped down when he was elected mayor in 2007.
By 2025, Ness was in his current position as executive director of the Ordean Foundation.
“I was approached by a couple of longtime music scenesters,” Ness recalled. “They said, ‘There are questions about (Homegrown’s) nonprofit status. There are questions about some governance issues. We’re concerned.’”
Ness agreed to join the board, and became president. The 2026 festival ran smoothly from an operational standpoint, but Ness found the financial reporting to be lacking.
Clint Austin / Duluth Media Group file photo
“The last board meeting that we had prior to the (co-directors’) resignations was intended to be an overview of the festival that was a month before,” Ness said. “I certainly felt very uncomfortable with how little financial information we were receiving.”
Lunt also joined the board in 2025, marking his first time serving in that capacity. He said the new board has been spending significant time addressing the accounting and reporting issues.
“Every year at Homegrown time I’m like, ‘I should get more involved,’ and then I don’t,” Lunt said. “Then this board thing came up, and it was kind of sold to me as, like, four meetings a year. I was like, ‘Oh, that’s perfect.’ And now we’re meeting weekly.”
Clint Austin / Duluth Media Group file photo
Although it’s unclear how the organization’s finances will look when the accounting and reporting issues have been fully addressed, along with any outstanding tax liabilities, both Ness and Lunt said they are confident the annual festival will continue without interruption.
“The organization will continue,” Ness said. “The festival will continue. Homegrown is in no danger in terms of its viability.” The financial documentation Ness initially received indicated budgeted revenues of about $140,000, against about $130,000 in expenses.
“Financially, I think we’re in a great spot. We have the money to hire the (financial) professionals, and we have (done so),” Lunt said. “We were hoping that we could get all this sorted out before it had to become more public.”
“We poured countless hours into this festival, and this is how it ends, with everyone talking about this,” Jezierski said. “It’s rough.”
“There’s a DIY ethos that is really at the core of Homegrown,” reflected Ness. “We’re throwing a music festival that isn’t waiting for some famous band from the East Coast to bless us with their presence. We are doing this on our own.”
Clint Austin / Duluth Media Group file photo
That DIY spirit also means “you’re kind of passing wisdom down from person to person, and sometimes that’s imperfect.” Ness continued. “The ways that we do things evolve over time, because it’s not a buttoned-down corporate sort of thing. That can create its own set of challenges.”
“It’s self-supporting,” said Lunt about the festival. “It’s widely volunteer-run. You do need to pay a couple people, obviously, to keep track of some things, but it’s going to be strong into the future. It’s gone through its bumps before.”
While most AI in financial services remains advisory, LUMIQ has built the layer that owns the decision — autonomous, auditable AI agents making regulated calls in production at leading banks, insurers, and capital markets firms. Today, LUMIQ serves clients across India, the United States, and Southeast Asia — leading institutions across insurance, banking, and capital markets.
NEW YORK and SINGAPORE, June 19, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — LUMIQ, an AI-native financial services company, today announced a strategic funding round to scale auto-decisioning for financial institutions across the United States and Southeast Asia. The round was led by Bajaj Finserv, one of India’s largest and most diversified financial services groups, with participation from existing investor Info Edge Ventures.
Right now, thousands of customers are waiting for a policy to be issued, a loan to be disbursed, a claim to be adjudicated, because somewhere an FSI employee is drowning in decisions, held back by the risk of getting it wrong. Today, when e-commerce delivers the same day, banks and insurers still decide in weeks. We built LiteCone to take that burden: AI decides the routine cases, completely and accountably, so humans spend their judgment on the one case that actually needs it. This round lets us bring that to every financial institution in the markets that matter most.
Shoaib Mohammad, Co-founder and CEO, LUMIQ
From AI that assists to AI that decides
For decades, financial institutions have bought technology that made their people faster — faster data, faster scoring, faster copilots. The decision still landed on a human. LUMIQ is changing that. Through its LiteCone platform, the company deploys AI agents that read the file, apply the institution’s own guidelines, and reach the decision end to end — escalating only the cases that genuinely require human judgment. The output is not a recommendation. It is a decision, with full reasoning attached, cross-referenced to policy, and defensible under audit.
The results in production speak clearly. At a leading life insurer, LUMIQ’s LEO agent decides 75–80% of underwriting cases with zero human touch, reduced policy issuance cost by roughly 25%, and compressed turnaround from days to under eight minutes — running 24×7 with complete auditability. Across its client base spanning insurance, banking, and capital markets in India, the US, and Southeast Asia, LUMIQ now processes millions of decisions annually.
LiteCone turns a real financial-services role into a working AI agent in weeks. Every agent we deploy is consistent, explainable, compliant, and auditable by design — not as an afterthought. This capital lets us go deeper on the platform and broader across roles. And through our cloud and AI lab partnerships, institutions will increasingly find LiteCone already embedded in the platforms they run today.
Vaibhav Dobriyal, Co-founder and Chief Product Officer, LUMIQ
Consumer confidence has plunged among traditionally optimistic younger adults amid fears for their personal finances and the wider economy, figures show.
GfK’s long-running Consumer Confidence Index remained unchanged at an overall score of minus 23 in June.
However, the analyst said this was was “misleading as, beneath the surface, there are new signs that confidence is weakening”.
Neil Bellamy, consumer insights director at GfK, said: “The biggest fall this month is among those aged 16 to 29, traditionally one of the most optimistic groups.
“Here confidence has dropped 11 points over the past month to minus two, the lowest level seen for two years, driven by large falls in views on both their own personal finances and the wider economy.
“More broadly, there are now no demographic groups with a positive confidence score, including higher-income households earning £50,000 or more, who have slipped back into negative territory as of June.
“Confidence remains subdued and vulnerable to further economic or political uncertainty.”
Overall, confidence in personal finances over the coming year remained flat at minus two, four points lower than this time last year.
The measures of both personal finances and the economy over the previous 12 months were both slightly down, by two points and three points respectively, “reflecting the sense that things have been extremely tough over the last year for so many”, GfK said.
The only measure to increase was expectations for the wider economy over the next 12 months, up two points to minus 36 but still eight points below this time last year.
The major purchase index, an indicator of confidence in buying big ticket items, remained at minus 20, four points lower than June last year.
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